Climate Communication

Led by Director Susan Hassol & Science Director Richard Somerville, Climate Communication is dedicated to improving public understanding of climate change. Climate Communication publicize and illuminate the latest climate research in plain language, making the science more accessible to the public and policy makers. They also support scientists in improving their communication and outreach.

They focus on issues like how scientific terminology may not be appropriate for a general audience, as some terms will have different meanings for scientists and the public - and how scientists need to be aware of this (see Figure 1 below). Fig. 1 is taken from the recently published paper 'Communicating the science of climate change' by Richard C.J. Somerville and Susan Joy Hassol, which is an excellent resource for researchers and scientists looking to improve the way they convey their findings to the public. For more information, see http://climatecommunication.org

Richard Somerville and John Tyndall

Climate Communication's Science Director Prof. Richard Somerville also attended the EPA-supported Tyndall Conference held in September 2011 in Dublin. This conference celebrated John Tyndall, and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his breakthrough experimental work on the absorption of infrared radiation by various atmospheric gases that are essentially transparent to solar radiation. Prof. Somerville also gave a public lecture which is available to view on YouTube on Tyndall: his work and scientific heritage as part of the EPA's ongoing climate change lecture series.

Figure 1: Terms that have different meanings for scientists and the general public